ST Lupita Nyong'o (Maz Kanata) in Episode VII

Nothing in particular, I suppose. For unstated reasons, MSW seems to think it's definitely concept art of Maz Kanata. I would imagine that those reasons are sound.

 

Maz's eyes look to be round and black. Sort of like traditional grey aliens eyes look. She looks like she has the nose of the MSW concept art. The eyes look different than the MSW art and Indie Revolver.

 

There's tons of concepts of Maz cooking, prepping, and dealing with food. I don't pretend to understand the power structure at that castle, but she makes drinks in like 30 different pieces or so I saw a while back.

I hope it is clear I'm not saying that's the Maz design in the film 100% or anything like that. I'm not. There's Rose concept, Rose's patrons, and general alien design. Some of the aliens from Maz's place were moved over to the "Rebel" base and this was just written on the concepts to reclassify them. Strange right?

I've seen the picture that IR posted really large and clear and it is a great piece. It appears as they moved away from the Asian inspired Exotic City, they may have moved Maz away from that look as well. I can tell you with certainty that if they went with any of the early design choices, scholars would be writing papers on Maz even more than they did with Jar Jar and Minstrelsy.

There's this period where Maz is very cartoony. Then it goes into this 1960's rich woman alien inspired by James Bond casino sequences. After that it changes to different types of alien looks moving away from the look in general. The interesting thing is that the final design might not have been nailed down 100% during filming and might have been altered to suit Lupita's performance and characteristics. I imagine we will see her very soon though.

 

I really liked this new concept art leaked of Maz Kanata, particularly because of what she's holding: a bowl (gourd) with some kind of straw (pump), that's reminds me of the tradicional drink in Argentina, the MATE HERB. Also, she is wearing some kind of poncho (we see Luke and Qui-Gon wearing too in the others movies) thats take us to the traditional culture of "el gaucho", made in Argentina seal.

 

Watch the BTS reel from SDCC and pay particular attention to the creature at 1 minute 54 seconds. VERY close resemblance to that latest supposed Maz concept art. It's even holding something up to its mouth like the picture. Either we just saw a practical art version of Maz OR that concept art was not used for Maz and was an early concept replaced by another creature.

 

Agreed. That is certainly the realization of the concept art above. It's also rather big for the Maz that has been described to us.

 

The creature at 40 seconds in the SDCC video resembles the early concept art of the little blue alien that I believe was supposed to be Maz Kanata. Is that an unused design they repurposed for something else? Naka perhaps?

 

Maz Kanata from the second trailer.




Comic- con reel

Spoiler

This creature, as jedijax said is seen at around 1 minute and 54 seconds in.




But as Kitster said, at 40 seconds in, you can see a creature talking that looks like the blue concept images of Kanata. They seem to be using a some sort of motion capture process mixed with puppetry.











So which one matches Maz more? Are the scales right?

One thing is for sure, that camera crew was there on a day when they were testing a lot of Maz's castle creatures.

 

So...are either of these Maz Kanata? I ask because they both match up with rumored concepts for her.

1. I hope so. Absolutely wonderful. Alien, yet wise, human and relatable. I could not have imagined a better design. Also, it looks like the puppet is being used to inform mo-cap...



2. A cool design, but it looks like it's going to be operated by a guy in a suit. And the face seem far less "articulate" than the above.



I think it's pretty safe to guess that #1 is very likely to be Maz Kanata, or very close to what she will look like.

 

The long neck puppet with the mo-tracked movement could be Naka maybe?

 

Possible. Though it looks very similar to a lot of the Maz Kanata concept art we have seen. So I'm going to guess that's Maz, for now.

 

Not sure it matches up with the side view from the trailer though. Could be that they were developed to be the same species but later switched it up.

 

I don't think that alien was Maz. What I think is that the concept art we saw was a very early design for Maz. Then, when Maz was changed, they used that early concept art and created a new creature based on it while Maz will look very different. I think they do that in a lot of movies. Use old concept art from a character and create something different from it.

 

Maybe Naka or Maz is Bob's girl

 

Of course that's possible. However, the animatronic looks very much like a "hero design," and I find it interesting that they decided to show it. So I'm inclined to believe it won't be a background character, even if it's not Maz, and that it will show up somewhere.

Would be a shame if it isn't Maz, IMO. It's just about perfect.

 

But Maz is CGI. That creature at 40 seconds looks a LITTLE like the other Maz art but less than the one at 1:54.

Perhaps just a model version so they can approximate the look and motion?

 

I find it curious that there's a giant statue of Maz Kanata outside her castle. Is she some sort of pirate queen in command of a kingdom, or does she lord over a big gang of ruffians? Do they worship her because of her Force abilities or something? Is she just an egomaniac? Her character has certainly been hard to pin down.

 

^Is there a rumor, set report or concept art of a Maz statue outside of the castle? I missed that...

 

Rodie: In the latest article from MakingStarWars...

 

What has perplexed me is MSW's reveal of the Maz concept looks a lot like what's in the teaser. Then in the behind the scenes reel we see another mo cap muppet that looks a lot like the other Maz concept art we have all seen. This new MO Cap work has to be expensive and time consuming, so its my guess they would only use it for principle roles in the film. So that begs the question, if MSW is indeed right, then what is the character name of the puppet we see in the behind the scenes reel. It has to be someone important.

 

DarthMalevonus: The only thing about that puppet is it's extremely wrinkled, and the alien in the teaser seems to have smooth skin on her arm, which leads me to believe the wrinkly one isn't Maz.

 

It is 100% confirmed in stone that the character Maz is Force Sensitive\ a Jedi?

 

All of the above.

 

Dammit when I saw this thread has been updated I thought we were getting another leak.

 

Not sure a JEDI would allow this kind of worship of themselves.